Happy birthday to Richard
I know, I'm a little late for Richard's birthday (it's in October) but I've finally finished the sweater I've been working on for him. I think that maybe I will start making him belly sweaters, or maybe vests only, because WOW was that a lot of knitting.
sweater blocking
This sweater is infernally difficult to photograph. I really had to diddle with the flash and the colours and the contrast, and it still looks pretty rough. Hopefully by the time it's dry (couplea days, probably) it will be sunny and Richard will wear it and I can get a Sears model picture of him in it.
For the inquiring minds out there, as I've mentioned before, this is an adaptation of Ann Budd's gansey pattern from an old Interweave knits. Richard is much longer and much bigger than the sweater in the magazine, and my gauge was a little different, as well.
I ended up having to add in two extra pattern panels (the ones with the diagonal stripes) and I used a fudgy-cheater type math in which I multiplied the pattern numbers by the % I needed to increase and then rounded up or down to get the closest number possible and have the right number of stitches for the cables and so on. I think other people might have been more thorough and calculated all the numbers exactly and done it on a to-scale diagram where one square equals 2 inches or something... but I like to live life on the edge (aka am lazy) so I just did it as I went.
I also had to rip out and restart the first sleeve after the first fudging of numbers resulted in a sleeve that was only big enough for me (it looked really funny when Richard tried it on, though. Like a cabled hot-dog). But other than that it looks great, I think. I hope Richard thinks so too. I know he likes it - he chose the yarn and the pattern, but I hope he wears it to bits. But not too soon. I need a five-year break before I knit another sweater that big.
close up of one of the cables. My favourite part. I love cables.
The worst part is we've been having ridiculously cold weather the last couple of days - one was -35 C with windchill - and now that I've finished this thing, they're calling for rain today. Figures.
And I had a dream last night that Richard washed the sweater in the washing machine and it shrank. What a nightmare.
sweater blocking
This sweater is infernally difficult to photograph. I really had to diddle with the flash and the colours and the contrast, and it still looks pretty rough. Hopefully by the time it's dry (couplea days, probably) it will be sunny and Richard will wear it and I can get a Sears model picture of him in it.
For the inquiring minds out there, as I've mentioned before, this is an adaptation of Ann Budd's gansey pattern from an old Interweave knits. Richard is much longer and much bigger than the sweater in the magazine, and my gauge was a little different, as well.
I ended up having to add in two extra pattern panels (the ones with the diagonal stripes) and I used a fudgy-cheater type math in which I multiplied the pattern numbers by the % I needed to increase and then rounded up or down to get the closest number possible and have the right number of stitches for the cables and so on. I think other people might have been more thorough and calculated all the numbers exactly and done it on a to-scale diagram where one square equals 2 inches or something... but I like to live life on the edge (aka am lazy) so I just did it as I went.
I also had to rip out and restart the first sleeve after the first fudging of numbers resulted in a sleeve that was only big enough for me (it looked really funny when Richard tried it on, though. Like a cabled hot-dog). But other than that it looks great, I think. I hope Richard thinks so too. I know he likes it - he chose the yarn and the pattern, but I hope he wears it to bits. But not too soon. I need a five-year break before I knit another sweater that big.
close up of one of the cables. My favourite part. I love cables.The worst part is we've been having ridiculously cold weather the last couple of days - one was -35 C with windchill - and now that I've finished this thing, they're calling for rain today. Figures.
And I had a dream last night that Richard washed the sweater in the washing machine and it shrank. What a nightmare.
posted by Valerie at 11:52 a.m.
1 Comments:
Valerie - the sweater looks great! And I bet it looks even better when Richard wears it. Well done!!
Sharon
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